should i be testing for iodine

[sergifed91]

I have a mixture of corals and fish and invertebrates. I test for everything else but Iodine and copper. should I be testing for iodine?

 

[AcroNem]

I would recommend testing for it. If you're doing larger more frequent water changes with a "good" salt mix it's likely fine. But it's still being used up and it's good practice to test and dose if needed.

 

[scott11106]

test for everything and in the rare occurance you have a problem you will catch it early which equals stability

 

[cristata.reef]

Iodine helps softies grow (especially mushrooms) so I would test for it especially if you're dosing

 

[rkpetersen]

The available test kits aren't great, though. Very easy to overdose.

 

[Ron Reefman]

I hate to be the naysayer here, but in 15 years I've never tested for iodine. I don't pay much attention to the test kits for it, but I read they were very unreliable when they first became available and even the iodine that you can buy at the LFS may not be what the water really needs. This would be a question better asked in the Chemistry Forum here and ask Randy Holmes Farley for his advice.

 

[Ghost25]

I think testing for iodine is a complete waste of time unless you aren't doing any water change or only very rarely. I'm probably in the minority but now that my tank is stable I don't even test alkalinity or calcium unless my corals look unhappy. Most salt mixes should replenish trace minerals, and my philosophy on testing is why chase numbers if the tank looks good?

 

[Ashish Patel]

Don't assume your tank need iodine, I was dosing 3 drops of lugols per day for 2 months with the plan of doing a icp test after that time frame - my iodine was at 0.09. I now dose maybe 2 drops every other month and test with the redsea iodine test kit. Its good test kit for letting you know if your tank is in a safe range so definitely recommend it. My iodine always reads above 0.08 so I believe the LRS reef frenzy and pellets I feed is putting some iodine in the system - not sure where else it could be coming from but this is with doing waterchanges as needed.